L.A. County Welfare Boss Says Cash Misspent

Los Angeles County’s head of welfare operations has admitted that his department improperly spent $20,504 on newspaper ads to announce the election of two officials sitting on the county’s Commission for Public Social Services.

Bryce Yokomizo, director of the Department of Public Social Services, said in a letter sent a week ago to county supervisors that department staff wrote news releases about the elections that should have been sent to reporters.

Instead, the releases were sent with a request to publish them as paid ads to seven newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, the Daily News and La Opinion.

“My department failed to determine, in advance, what the cost would be for these ads,” Yokomizo wrote. “Moreover, regardless of cost, a notice like this should never have been purchased at public expense.”

He wrote that he had spoken with the people responsible, whom he described as having “otherwise excellent performance records,” and said that the same mistake would not be made again.

The ads heralded the reelection of Frank de Balogh as chairman and the election of Corinne A. Sanchez as vice chairwoman of the commission, which oversees operations at the Department of Public Social Services.